Hip-Hop Weighs in on Drake v. Meek Mill "Beef"

A$AP Rocky, Ice Cube and Q-Tip weigh in on the ongoing drama between Meek Mill and Drake.

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The summer of beef between Drake and Meek Mill continues to move right along, and over the weekend we heard from a number of respected hip-hop artists - both old and new - who voiced their opinion on the matter.

A$AP Rocky spoke with MTV's Adam Fleischer backstage at Lollapalooza on Sunday (8/2), and responded to a question about Drake potentially using a ghostwriter with the following:

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“If you ask me if that matters, or if the public cares, that’s two different questions. I think that it doesn’t matter at this point for the public — they seem like they don’t care. I don’t know. To me it matters.”

The possibility obviously mattered to Rocky, but he's still taking Drake as the champion thus far.

“I think Meek will be fine ... I think he has a fanbase of his own, and I think that at the end of the day, there had to be a loser in the outcome, and it was Meek. So it is what it is.

If somebody helped Drake, I dunno, that might be considered cheating, but whoever wrote that — not saying Drake ain’t write it, I’m quite sure he did — that sh-t was insane. That sh-t was incredible, and I wanna thank Drake and Meek Mill for such a good battle. I come from an old school aesthetic — me being 26 — coming from the point of, when I was coming up, it was all about writing your rhymes, and I’m quite sure for R&B songs, if someone’s giving you [lyrics], that’s nothing. I don’t know. I would have to see. I don’t know what to believe.

Regardless of if Drake write his sh-t or not, I’m still a fan.”

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It always helps to hear from someone who's been in the game for decades, laying witness to countless rap beefs from the perspective of a fellow respected artist. Luckily, Ice Cube also shared his thoughts on the situation, speaking with The Daily Beast about the beef, and who better to do so than someone who holds one of the most potent diss records of all time in "No Vaseline?" Unlucky, for Meek at least, Cube also seems to be siding with Drake... at least so far.

“Drake is winning right now ... But, you know… Meek could come back.”

Short, sweet and to the point. Not everyone was quick to take sides, however, evidenced by Q-Tip, who was asked about Drake and Meek's beef by Complex's Noah Callahan-Bever. Rather than declaring victory by either side, the legendary emcee/producer spoke more broadly about how the situation affects hip-hop culture as a whole, and comparing the level of discussion it could generate to Main Source's 1991 commentary on police brutality, "Just a Friendly Game of Baseball."

"This is not about Meek. It’s about the culture ... I want this to be something that spurs conversation and interest. I want people to be like, 'How come you didn’t put this? How come he put too much of that?' I want to see people talk about it. I want to see people engage in it. Like, 'I didn’t even realize he said that!' I want people to have that kind of conversation. You can hit certain subjects and it’s just as fresh as when they first said it. When you listen to, 'Just A Friendly Game of Baseball,' it’s just so timely. It was so ill. It was really unique and it was a specific innovation to those lines, those bars, that choice of words, the cadence. To have that living next to 'Fuck niggas up, laugh about it' is just interesting. The concepts of it all are really interesting."

Perhaps the most entertaining story, and the most damning for Meek, to come out of this weekend originates from Philadelphia Eagles training camp. Reporter Eliot Shorr-Parks was present on Sunday to give us the play-by-play on the team's musical selections, first commenting that the practice started on the side of #TeamMeek through the play of "R.I.C.O."

Only about three minutes later, Meek's hometown team made their true alliance apparent.

Of course, all of this is in good fun. Like it or not, this story remains the most entertaining situation in hip-hop right now. Our thoughts on the subject are well known, though it remains to be seen if the beef is officially over or not. Will we be hearing more from Meek? Drake?

In light of everything, let's take a look back to 2011, when the two were on better terms, opening up on the influence that each has had on the other while backstage at the Jingle Jam in Connecticut. It was all good just a week few years ago...

[By Brendan Varan. He's not ready for this beef to end. Follow him on Twitter.]